Women may start training in Coronado as Navy SEALs in 2016, according to an Associated Press report Monday, which also said female sailors may join Navy Riverine units for initial training next month.

Details of the Pentagon’s plan for allowing women into the last bastions of male-only combat are expected to be announced today. In addition to the SEALs, Army Ranger units would open to women for training by mid-2015.

Sailors assigned to Coastal Riverine Squadron (CRS) 1 conduct training in small boat defensive tactics in San Diego bay. The Coastal Riverine Force is a core Navy capability that provides port and harbor security, high value asset protection and maritime security operations in coastal and inland waterways.— Courtesy of U.S. Navy

Sailors assigned to Coastal Riverine Squadron (CRS) 1 conduct training in small boat defensive tactics in San Diego bay. The Coastal Riverine Force is a core Navy capability that provides port and harbor security, high value asset protection and maritime security operations in coastal and inland waterways.
/ Courtesy of U.S. Navy

These changes would be especially felt in San Diego. All SEALs go through initial training at the Coronado compound off the Silver Strand, where the parent Naval Special Warfare Command also resides. The Navy’s Coastal Riverine Group 1 is headquartered in Imperial Beach and includes three squadrons of small boats in Coronado.

Physical standards for serving in close-combat units apparently would not change. One of the hot-button topics in the debate over integration of women has been whether physical requirements would be lowered — for example, would females be allowed to do fewer pull-ups and still qualify.

The services are reviewing standards for many jobs, including looking at strength and stamina, in order to set requirements for troops regardless of their sex.

Concerned about this issue, Rep. Duncan Hunter, R-Alpine, got language in the House defense bill passed Friday dictating that standards must be gender-neutral for specialty roles.

“This appears to be a decision to open eligibility while keeping standards already in place — rather than adjusting standards to take less-qualified individuals,” said Joe Kasper, Hunter’s spokesman.

“That may ultimately be something the Pentagon tries. But even those who are making decisions have to know that it would devalue the prestige of special operations and other specialties.”

One former San Diego SEAL said he has no doubt women can make the cut, physically.

Brandon Webb, a former SEAL sniper instructor, predicted that the problems will come in trying to integrate females in the rough-and-tumble culture of special operations, in addition to the fraternization issues raised by people working in small, tight-knit units in the field.

“The main issue that the military must face is the brash/candid environment and close-quarters culture of a special-operations unit that would make most civilian HR managers blush,” said Webb, who runs a website, sofrep.com, about the world of special operations forces.

He predicts sexual relationships will occur in field units.

“This is the main issue I see, and the only way around it is to either accept that this will happen and develop protocols to deal with it, or have all-female units,” he said. “I’m a fan of the latter.”

Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel reviewed the plans and has ordered the services to move ahead, according to the AP report.

Under the schedules military leaders delivered to Hagel, the Army will develop standards by July 2015 to allow women to train and potentially serve as Rangers, and qualified women could begin training as Navy SEALS by March 2016 if senior leaders agree.

The Navy plans to have studies finished by July 2014 on allowing women to serve as SEALs, and has set October 2015 as the date when women could begin Navy boot camp with the expressed intention of becoming SEALs eventually.